Wheaton is still feeling the pressure from the Department of Justice’s investigation. The investigation has asked for files spanning from 2012 to 2015 concerning the sexual assault cases, looking for a breach in Title IX policies. The first step of the investigation proved to be very challenging and a bit of a hiccup in the process, as the information that was supposed to have been provided by Wheaton by Sept. 30 was not in on time. The Wheaton administration asked and was granted an extension to hand in the information, and the new deadline is Oct. 15.
President Dennis Hanno talked a bit about the information deadline several weeks ago when he let students know the details of the investigation. “We must get this together by September 30. So that’s not a lot of time and everything must be provided electronically. We will meet the deadline,” Hanno said. At the time President Hanno had even joked a bit with Dean Kate Kenny at the meeting, as he asked, “We will meet the deadline. Right?,” obviously acknowledging how challenging the deadline was.
Wheaton’s Title IX Coordinator Darlene Boroviak talked about the amount of information that had been sent so far. She said, “We sent a big batch of documents by September 30. We had gotten an extension for some of the material until October 15 and we are still working on getting that material ready.” Boroviak is happy that the extension is seemingly not going to cause any true turmoil for this investigation. “We [are] pleased that we were able to be very responsive and provide everything [The Department of Justice] has asked for.”